K.L.VIRMANI Vs. KRISHNA DHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS revision petition is filed by the LIC of India, who were OP-3 in the consumer complaint decided by the District Forum, (East) NCT of Delhi. The other two OPs were Secretary and General Manager of Delhi Co-operative Group Housing Society. The claim of the Complainant, Smt. Krishna Dhar was rejected by the District Forum, but her appeal against the rejection has been allowed by the State Commission. The State Commission has held that the outstanding amount of the loan, if any, was recoverable from OP-3/the revision petitioner, as the Complainant was the direct beneficiary of the contract between OP-2 and OP-3.

(2.) WE have carefully perused the records and heard the counsels for the two parties. The revision petition has been filled with a very large delay of 558 days. This delay is sought to be explained by the revision petitioner through a very short, perfunctory and non-specific application for its condonation. The impugned order was passed by the Delhi State Commission on 3.7.2008. The revision petition challenging it has been filed on 2.6.2010 which is after a gap of 23 months. Yet, the application does not even disclose the date when the petitioner came to know that the impugned order had been passed. It only states that certified copy was applied for on 25.2.2010 and received on 5.3.2010. A perusal of the application for condonation clearly shows that it is a mere prayer to condone the delay without any details. This Commission would therefore, like to express its complete disappointment with the manner in which the question of limitation has been addressed by the petitioner, LIC of India. The petitioner was aware of the huge gap of 23 months between the date of the impugned order and the date when the revision petition was eventually filed. The petitioner is also aware that the law permits a period of only 90 days for filing of such a petition and that delay, if any, has to have a reasonable justification. Yet, the application filed by the LIC makes no effort to explain this huge gap, with what could be considered as sufficient cause.

(3.) BEFORE the fora below, the case of the complainant was that loan instalments were being paid regularly by her father. His death was duly reported to the Society. The latter had passed a resolution in the AGM accepting substitution of the name of the complainant in place of her father. The OP Society had also resolved to claim the outstanding loan amount from the LIC. While all this happened during 1993 and 1994, years later the Complainant received a legal notice in 2001 from the OP Society to pay a sum of Rs.2,74,747/- towards the outstanding loan of her father.